Balancing Act

Martha, Ili and I went for an afternoon walk to Kirkland before Thanksgiving dinner. This funny seagull kept trying to balance on buoy.

City Fish Market

Ah... Good old Pike's Market. I know, I know, another picture of a place I've taken several pictures of, but it's been a while since all the neon lights work. See this location in Live Maps.

ISO 500 | 26 mm | f/4.0 | 1/60 sec

Stick Man

If I were a stick man, this is what I might look like. I've only played with light drawings once before. I acknowledge I'm not good at it, but at least it's fun. I drew the figure with the back light of my bike.

Stormy

Storm clouds over the Puget Sound.

ISO 250 | 31 mm | f/4.5 | 1/13 sec

Splash of Pink

Came across these flowers a few weeks ago. Not your typical Fall color, but stunning nevertheless. Please enlarge, as they look a bit faded in the thumbnail.

ISO 500 | 45 mm | f/5.3 | 1/100 sec

ISO 500 | 55 mm | f/6.3 | 1/160 sec

Casualties of Fall

The beauty of Fall is almost over. The fading colors lie scattered across the ground defeated by the inevitability of life.

ISO 500 | 38 mm | f/5.0 | 1/100 sec

ISO 500 | 35 mm | f/4.8 | 1/100 sec

ISO 500 | 31 mm | f/4.5 | 1/160 sec

Banking for the Poor

Today, Ili and I had the privileged of going to see last year's Nobel Prize winner Dr. Yunus. Dr. Yunus was invited to Microsoft to talk about his work on microcredit and how he was inspired to create the Grameen Bank which gives loans to the poor without expecting any financial gain. It truly is a great idea that has now helped thousands of people across the world to come out of poverty and improve their life style.

Dr. Muhammad Yunus

Dr. Yunus was invited to fit in with Microsoft's annual Giving campaign. Employees are encouraged to donate throughout the month of October to nonprofit organizations in the US and across the world. Microsoft will then match the employee donations dollar for dollar. Besides donating money, we are also encouraged to donate time and help with local organizations. Last year's Giving campaign raised over $72 million.

It's good to work for such a large company that is also socially minded and recognizes it's ability to help across the world. Social responsibility is something that is usually ignored by companies and I certainly think it's something more companies need to do.

The Grameen Bank, which Dr. Yunus founded in the 70's is a purely social-business; it doesn't seek to make a profit, only what it needs to exist. It's not a charity it doesn't give anything away, therefore it doesn't create a dependency, yet it helps people raise themselves out of poverty and lead a better life.

Answering employee questions after his talk.

To find out more about microcredit, Dr. Yunus, the Grameen Bank and the Grameen Foundation, follow the links scared around this post.

It was Bill Gates' mom that suggested he start the Microsoft Giving Campaign in 1979.

Blushing Orange

The first orange leafs on a yellow tree.

ISO 500 | 55 mm | f/5.6 | 1/50 sec

Jack-o-lantern Wannabes

A mountain of pumpkins outside a small grocery store in east Seattle.

ISO 500 | 22 mm | f/9.0 | 1/320 sec

A Proposal

Today was a very special day. On the pretext of simply a nice walk in a garden, I took my girlfriend Martha to the Japanese garden in Seattle. After walking around and taking some pictures, I proposed to her while we were enjoying the view in a small hut. After a few moments of total surprise, I was relieved and so happy when she said yes!

Neither of us are much for the big and fancy, so I thought the quiet and peaceful Japanese garden would be perfect for the occasion. While the spring flowers have long gone, the autumn colors were fantastic.

The Crapster

Today was the Red Bull soapbox race in Seattle. I've never seen a soapbox derby before, so this was fun. There were many funny looking cars, but this one was my favorite of them all.

Racing down Freemont Avenue

Afternoon Shadows

Chairs at the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle.

ISO 400 | 20 mm | f/10 | 1/400 sec

Space and Rocket Center

I spent the long Labor Day weekend in Huntsville, Alabama with my girlfriend Martha. About the only interesting thing to do in this town is visit NASA's Space and Rocket Center. It has a fairly good museum about NASA and in particular the Apollo missions. In the first picture, I'm standing bellow the thrusters of a Saturn I rocket replica.

Dwarfed by the Saturn I rocket

In this picture, Martha touches the tip of the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird spy plane. See this location in Live Maps.

Touching a point of history

Spicy Peppers

Center of a wreath made out red peppers. You can find an assortments of pepper wreaths at Seattle's Pike's Market.

ISO 400 | 120 mm | f/4.8 | 1/50 sec

Seattle Moonset

A moonset over Seattle as seen across Lake Washington at the Kirkland Marina. Downtown Seattle is over on the far left and the two streaks across the sky are planes headed towards SeaTac airport, not UFOs :-)

ISO 125 | 55 mm | f/4.5 | 6 sec

Tolmie Peak

Small Island in Mowich Lake.
Ili and I went hiking to Mount Rainier today. We hiked from Mowich Lake up to Tolmie Peak. For the most part, it was a very nice and pleasant hike. However, when we reached Eunice Lake we were attacked by mosquitoes and flies. As if that wasn't enough, when we reached to top of Tolmie Peak, you literally couldn't stand still even for a second before being swarmed by mosquitoes.

Although Mount Rainier was partly hidden by clouds, the view was still incredible. But, because of the clouds of mosquitoes we didn't stay for more than 5 minutes. By the time we got back to the car, I had at least 25 bites on my legs and another 15 or so on my arms. Note to self, next time, take mosquito repellent!

Cloud covered view of Mt. Rainier from Tolmie Peak.

You can see the remainder of these pictures in my Picasa Web Album. You can also see this location in Live Maps.

Seafair

Just a few pictures of this year's Seafair festival. The best part of it all were the Blue Angels. You can see the rest of these pictures in my Picasa Web Album. You can also see this location in Live Maps.

Kite Fest

This weekend was the Seattle Kite Fest. It was held at Magnusson Park just north of Seattle with a nice view of Lake Washington. Frankly, I was very disappointed. I was expecting to see dozens of cool kites crowding the sky, but there were hardly any. Most were plain hand made rectangular kites. It seems that the event is mostly for kids, but I would have expected at least some cool kites. This dragon was just about the only neat one in the sky. See this location in Live Maps.

Dragons do exist

Sun Bathing

Just some flowers sitting on my porch on a sunny day.

Enjoying the sun...

Navajo Pottery

It's back to work... This is the only souvenir I got on this trip besides a few post cards and refrigerator magnets. It's a small hand carved Navajo pot that I bought in Flagstaff.

Apache Trail

So sad, this is our last full day in Arizona. We had to drive back Phoenix so instead of taking the fast and boring Interstate, we took the scenic view. Our first scenic stop was at the Tonto National Monument cliff dwellings near Roosevelt, AZ. These dwellings were built and inhabited by the Salado people in the Tonto Basin. See this location in Live Maps.

Tonto National Monument cliff dwellings

While we were still at the dwellings, up in the sky was a group of hawks flying around. I was lucky to have my camera pointed at them at the right time when these two were diving straight for the ground. It's basically a game of chicken where one tries to crash the other into the ground. They released each other a fair distance from the ground, so no one got hurt.

Dueling hawks (enlarge)

From Roosevelt, we took highway 88 back to Phoenix. This section of the Apache Trail has 30 miles of unpaved dirt road that takes you up narrow winding paths, but all with incredible views. I was tired of driving all week long, so Martha took the wheel while I took the pictures. Most of the road is a two lane road, but there is a one lane section that takes you up a steep cliff side. There are only a few places where two cars can pass each other. We were on the outside of the road, making it even more interesting.

One lane road on the Apache Trail

Towards the end of the road, there is a an overlook we stopped at for this beautiful view.

Scenic view towards the end of the trail

Crepuscular rays in the distance

Canyon de Chelly

We spent the night in Chinle on the Navajo Indian Reservation. In the morning, we drove over the Canyon de Chelly National Monument (pronounced da Shay). Since we were on a bit of a tight schedule today, we didn't hike to the bottom of the canyon and simply enjoyed the views from above. In this picture, you see the most prominent and famous part of the canyon, Spider Rock which stands 800 ft. tall. It was nice to see it on this trip as the last time I was there, we were snowed out. See this location in Live Maps.

Spider Rock spire

Besides Spider Rock, the other attractions in the canyon are several Navajo and Anasazi ruins. Below you see the Anasazi White House ruins. It might be a bit hard to tell in the pictures below, but the ruins are named for the white colored house at the center top of the ruins.

White House ruins

We spent the rest of the day driving, but we made a few stops along the way. One of the first stops was at the Hubble Trading Post in Ganado. If you have the extra money, it's the perfect place to buy quality Navajo rugs and jewelry. I couldn't afford a rug this time around, but here is a picture of the rug I got last year when I visited with Jose and Tim.

Broken log in the Petrified Forest

Later in the afternoon, we drove to the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest. Despite being here last year, it's still an amazing view and a neat experience to walk through the remains of a 3 million year old forest. Unfortunately, like last time, it was also cloudy. See this location in Live Maps.

More petrified wood

As usual, you can see the entire collection of pictures for Canyon the Chelly, the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest in my Picasa Web Album.

Monument Valley

Monument Valley.

Mexican Hat.

Storm clouds ahead.

Arizona sunset.

Glen Canyon

For now a small description will do. The first picture is not Glen Canyon, it's a view of north and east of the Grand Canyon. The last (poorly stitched) picture is of the Carl-Hayden dam in Glen Canyon. The lake is at record lows since the 1940's (I think, so don't quote me on that).

A small note about the tree. As I stooped and clicked away, a tourist (the big fat ones you see in movies) walks by and says "it's only a tree". With indignation I kept snapping away, but that made me wonder how many things I pass every day and think, "it's only a tree". However, browsing the pictures on this site (Photoblog), I'm glad to see that there are many of you that don't pass by everyday things and think it's only a tree.

Northern and eastern view of the Grand Canyon.

Neat looking tree.

Even in harsh environments, beauty abounds.

Carl-Hayden dam and Lake Powell.

Grand Canyon

I survived the Grand Canyon for the second time! My first trip to the Grand Canyon was with my brother Jose and my Dad back in 2001. This time, instead of hiking to the bottom and back in one day (not recommended by the Rangers), Martha and I took the Bright Angel trail down to Plateau Point. From the ridge to Plateau Point it's a 6.1 mile (9.8 km) hike that descends ~0.6 miles (0.9 km).

ISO 500 | 18 mm | f/13.0 | 1/640 sec

ISO 500 | 18 mm | f/11.0 | 1/500 sec

You may think, oh, only to Plateau Point, that's nothing! However, this time we were hiking in 123° F (50° C) weather! Most of this was in the middle of the day, so there isn't much shade or any at all. After sizzling some time at the Point and catching a few glimpses of the Colorado River, we headed back to Indian Gardens to wait in the shade until the sun wasn't so hot. See this location on Live Maps.

ISO 500 | 23 mm | f/13.0 | 1/640 sec

As soon as the sun was hidden by the western ridge, the temperature dropped nearly 20 degrees. That made hiking much more bearable, but it was still 103° F (39° C). We took the 4.5 mile hike back fairly slow, but at least this way we go to see some awesome colors and contrasts that you don't see during the day. It was a bit hard choosing which pictures to post here, so please look at my full set of Grand Canyon pictures in my Picasa Web Album.

ISO 500 | 24 mm | f/11.0 | 1/500 sec

ISO 500 | 18 mm | f/10.0 | 1/400 sec